Tips for light-tackle Billfishing

It is quite amazing how many anglers think you must have a big gameboat, lots of expensive navigational equipment and loads of fishing tackle to go and catch a billfish - but they're wrong. There have been plenty of times over the years when trailerboats have won major gamefishing tournaments while competing with the big-boys in their 40-50-footers.

The Port Stephens Interclub Tournament, for example, has been taken out a number of times by small boats, and the Coffs Harbour Hot Currents tournament is another example of small-boat domination.

The recent Port Hinchinbrook Big Fish Classic in North Queensland was also won by a 20ft Haines Hunter trailerboat. These guys aboard the vessel Ocean Hunter had plenty of stiff opposition from the professional gamefishing charterboats up to 55ft long as well!

Setting up an offshore trailerboat to target billfish can be a fairly easy operation, and it doesn't have to cost the earth. Several options are essential in the fitout, such as sturdy rodholders, a set of outriggers - which give you the spread to troll up to four lines at once - and a recirculating livebait tank.

On the electrical side of things, apart from a good radio and EPIRB for safety reasons of course, a GPS and a depthsounder can be your most valuable fishing tools.

BREAK IT DOWN
Starting at the basics though, you need at least four sturdy rodholders, and two should be positioned near the transom - facing straight astern to troll your two flatlines (the line coming straight off the rod tip). The other two should be positioned on a slight angle (about 30°) facing towards the outriggers' tips, so when you get a strike and the line releases from the outrigger clip it won't foul the other rod in the rear holder.

When you fit the outriggers, mount the bases as high as possible on either an overhead rod rack or on the topside of the cabin or console. The longer the poles - within reason, of course - the better they will work the spread on the outside lines, plus help the lures or skip baits work with more action.

Attaching the fishing lines to the outrigger lanyard cords can be done with pegs or rubber bands, but the best connectors are the little "Blacks" fully-adjustable release clips, which are available at all tackle shops. Even when using lures, these beaut release clips work exceptionally well.

WE GOT A LIVE ONE HERE
The next important option is a livebait tank, and these days many vessels are constructed with a bait well of some description built in to the transom or under the floor.

A supply of live baits some days can make the difference between catching a billfish or not, and if the fish are shying off the lures or trolled dead baits, a live bait slow-trolled or even drifted though the area where the billfish are working can be a dynamite technique.

Setting up or installing a livebait tank is an easy job, and portable units are available from larger boat dealers and some tackle shops if your vessel doesn't have a built-in facility. If you install a portable tank, it needs to be secured firmly to either the floor or the transom of the boat so it doesn't move around when you're pitching around out at sea.

To keep the baits alive and well, it's best to have a couple of circulating setups to keep the water turning over. A pick-up tube connected to the tank needs to be fitted to the transom of the boat, just tucked under to scoop up water while you are travelling at a reasonable speed.

When you are drifting or even slow-trolling, a small submergible bilge pump mounted on a plate on the transom just under the waterline will do the job to keep the water flowing into the tank.

As stated earlier, the two pieces of electrical equipment invaluable for this style of fishing are a GPS and a good depthsounder - preferably a colour unit if you can afford one.

The depthsounder will help you locate the schools of bait over the deep drop-offs or hard reef grounds. Tightly-packed schools of bait show up as round clumps, or sometimes as long streaks up off the bottom line indicated on your sounder's screen.

Once you have located any bait activity or had a strike from a billfish, you can mark the exact area with the GPS, which enables you to concentrate on the spot for more action.

1200 TECHNIQUES
The techniques for catching billfish from a small boat are really no different to the methods used on larger vessels, and because a small boat can manoeuvre more easily and usually troll a lot slower, they can sometimes have a real advantage when trolling live baits.

Live baits, whether they are slimy mackerel, big yellowtail, frigate mackerel or small striped tuna, need to be trolled at only a couple of knots - otherwise they will come to the surface and start spinning around and end up dying.

Head-rigged dead skip baits such as sauries or garfish can be trolled a fair bit quicker - at around 4-5kt (7-9kmh) - and surface lures such as the popular medium Pakula Cockroaches and Sprokets or TopGun Terminators can be trolled at speeds of 6-8kt (11-15kmh).

Once a hook-up is achieved, the first and foremost thing to do is to keep the boat idling forward and clear the other tackle to avoid tangles. When you're trolling dead baits or lures, this might mean clearing three other outfits.

By the time you do this, there's a fair chance the fish will have stripped off a bit of line - but providing the drag has been set correctly (one third of the breaking strain of the line used) there's no way you will break the fish off.

Having a few hundred metres of line in the water can often be a good thing, because the water pressure on the line will help keep the hook set, even if the billfish starts to jump around.

The only time you need to be careful about the amount of line in the water is when you strike a marlin that keeps on running - like a hot blue - and then the drag pressure must be eased back as the diameter diminishes on the spool.

CLOSING IN
Once the tackle is cleared, the right technique is to spin the boat roughly in the direction of the fish and give chase, keeping a slight angle on the line to allow the angler to retrieve the slack without running over it. Use commonsense at this time and go after the fish at a speed the sea conditions will allow.

Once you are close to the fish or it has sounded (gone deep), try to keep a good angle on the line at all times, as you won't achieve anything by working directly over the top of the fish.

If the wind is puffing, it's best to work the boat on the downwind side of the fish, so when you start to get closer the boat won't get blown over the top of the fish. This could result in the line getting caught up under the boat or around the motor leg somewhere, and you know what that means - yep, a lost fish!

Being patient and keeping your cool is very important, and that's hard to do - particularly if you're onto your first billfish. Trying to take any billfish too quick in a small boat can end up a disaster in more ways than one, as they sometimes jump right next to the boat - and there have been plenty of cases where a marlin has ended up jumping into the boat.

Juvenile blacks pose the biggest threat in this department, and it usually happens when the extra pressure of the trace or the tag has been felt. These days, trying to catch a billfish requires plenty of time on the water, but the effort is well rewarded when you experience your first catch and release on the most adrenalin-charged fish in the ocean!

Billfish: Where do I look?

On the east coast of Australia, billfish are found from the Great Barrier Reef off Cape York Peninsula, right down to Eden - and sometimes even further south off Tasmania, depending on the currents.

During the winter months, about the only reliable area you can catch small black marlin and sailfish is in the warm waters inside and outside the GBR from Cape York down to the Whitsunday Islands. By springtime, when the ocean currents start to warm up, giant black marlin show up off Lizard Island and Cairns. Inside the reef, small backs and sails are still around right up until summer, when the water gets too hot.

As warm currents move south, sailfish and black marlin can be found along with striped marlin off Fraser Island, Mooloolaba and right down to the Gold Coast. By summer, blue marlin can also be found here, but this species is usually only caught out wide off the continental shelf and over deep canyons. Late spring and early summer sees all three marlin species begin to move right down the NSW coast to Bermagui.

Water temperature for marlin is critical, and the preferred temperature for striped marlin is a lot wider than the other two species. Striped marlin will happily feed in cool, temperate to warm currents ranging from 19-29C. Black marlin prefer slightly warmer conditions, between 21 and 29C, whereas the blue marlin definitely prefers warmer conditions, between 22 and 31C.

The areas to find marlin are shallow to deep reef structures, along the continental shelf or the deep seamounts or submarine canyons - any place where steep or hard contours help push up the nutrient-rich and deepwater currents. This is where you'll find the baitfish, along with other smaller tuna or deepwater fish species upon which the marlin will feed.

Prominent current lines or around floating objects such as logs are all good places to troll, as they can often hold baitfish or mahi mahi. Finding sea birds, particularly shearwaters, terns and small petrels is also the key to locating mass bait schools on the surface or mid-water.